Of 'courtesy calls' and 'landing fees'

This is how they do it nowadays. The Cabinet member’s chief of staff approaches the industry leader and says: “Though new in his post, the Secretary knows that you are one of the sector’s movers and shakers. He and I think you should pay him a ‘courtesy call’.”

What the hell for, the private exec asks.

“Well, you and he need to discuss the ‘landing rights’,” the chief aide would reply.

What ‘landing rights’?

“You know ... the ‘landing fees’,” the rep will persist. “You need to give P2 million to us for every contract approval.”

There are variations thereof. The congressman’s chief of staff nudges the industry leader: “Sir, my boss is the new committee chairman for your sector. Sana magpugay kayo (pay your respects).”

Why should I, I don’t deal with politicos anyway, the businessman asks.

To which the aide would have a ready answer: “Sir, he will explain to you the new kalakaran (rules of the game). You see, it’s no longer his dad who calls the shots. The old man’s been terribly sick since 2007. We’re now in charge of collections, and we just keep him happy with a supply of molls.”

One time they called Japanese, Chinese and Korean execs to mid-afternoon snacks to deliver the same message using the same buzzwords. The foreigners didn’t understand. On the way out of the hotel function room, one exec asked his friend in Japanese what the meeting was all about. An assistant of the congressman, who speaks Nihongo, herded everybody back in. Whereupon the congressman repeated his line in clearer, crasser terms: “Give, or else.”

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Officials of the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas were quick enough to file charges against Celso de los Angeles and cohorts for the collapse of 13 rural banks. But will the courts be as quick to decide the cases? Not so, going by the records of a similar case.

Early in 1998 BSP examiners of Orient Bank unearthed 119 dubious loans. The Monetary Board closed down the bank and requested the NBI to dig deeper. The NBI filed charges in Oct. 1998, which prosecutors elevated to courts in Aug. 1999. Orient Bank owners-directors were indicted for one count of lending to themselves P2.7 billion, and 34 counts of fictitious loans totaling P962 million thru forgery of borrowers’ signatures. What has happened since?

• In the first, self-lending, the Manila regional trial court dropped the case in June 2003. In Oct. 2006 the Court of Appeals rejected the ruling and ordered a new trial by a different judge. Orient Bank owner Jose C. Go asked for a review by the Supreme Court, when it pends.

• The second, broken down into seven counts of fraud at the Manila RTC and seven counts of forgery at the Manila metropolitan trial court, is still being heard.

The Philippine Deposit Insurance Corp., which had to pay Orient Bank’s duped depositors, filed four separate cases with the Manila courts. Two counts were for fraud worth P20 million, another for fraud of P178.3 million, two more counts of fraud of P20 million, and 24 more counts for PP140.4 million — totaling P358.7 million. Again the status:

• Case 1, filed in Nov. 2002, is still being heard by the lower court;

• Case 2, filed Dec. 2002, was dismissed May 2006, but the motion for reconsideration filed Oct. 2006 is still awaits decision;

• Case 3, filed Nov. 2002, is still under trial; and

• Case 4, filed Oct. 2000, was dismissed in Aug. 2001, and the judge rejected the motion to reconsider in Dec. 2001.

In short, cases are dragging, with no convictions so far, for Orient Bank indictees. No wonder the likes of de los Angeles find the situation emboldeing.

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In naming Malacañang aide Manuel Gaite to replace disgraced SEC commissioner Jesus Martinez, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo showed insincerity in cleaning up the corporate regulator. Martinez fell after being exposed for accepting de los Angeles’s gifts of a P5-million house and a P1.5 million SUV. Arroyo rode on the issue by having Martinez suspended a day before retiring last Thursday. But then she swiftly put in Gaite, her deputy executive secretary who had given Jun Lozada half-a-million pesos in Feb. 2008 to stay out of the country and the Senate inquiry into the NBN-ZTE scam.

It will be recalled that Lozada, stricken with conscience, returned to testify and named Gaite as one of three bribers to keep quiet. Gaite, under senators’ grilling, unconvincingly claimed he lent out personal cash, borrowed at that from an uncle, because he took pity on Lozada. He also stammered that he met Lozada very briefly only once.

Gaite was a bad coverup man, but a loyal one, hence his reward. He must have a personal mission for Arroyo to be in SEC. It can only be in connection with the front companies of presidential kin and cronies.

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